A Change of Scene with some Ali
by AddienaTheBlueSpirit
Summary: a girl from our world wakes up on zuko's ship just before the north pole invasion...i don't own avatar.
1. Chapter 1

Prologue

"Someday, I swear, I'll make the world see me for who I am." Stated a young Fire bender. "Ya, and someday Zuko's honor will be restored…ha. Three years, you'd of thought that he'd of managed to at least do something productive in that time." She looked in the tent flap at the sleeping Zuko and sighs. "P.Z., I hate what I have to do, but it's do this now or face Azula later." She leaned forward and inserted the initial blow of lightning into Zuko's heart and…missed that couldn't be right. She looked down he was still asleep but gasping for breath, and worse his friends probably heard the explosion. But she was rooted to the spot thinking about how she and Zuko had first met….

It had been a windy day at sea when they actually got to know each other. She was mulling her hair, which she had recently discovered was black, into a series of braids that she was holding in place with golden forks. After he had gotten over the first half of what she had just told him, Zuko stated, "so your full name is Alura?"

That of course had happened over two months before, a lot had happened between now and then. She touched the comb in the back of her braids, the comb that Zuko had welded out of two of the forks using Fire Bending, fell to her knees beside him, and began to cry.


	2. zuko's stowaway

Chapter Two; Let's Go Disappoint the World

"Careful, it's hot." He warned her as she removed the forks from her hair. He gently placed the comb in the back of her hair to hold two of her four braids in place. Then she took two strips of torn fabric and tides them around the others. When she looked up he said, "Welcome to the team." She smiled at him and two of her braids fell in her face. He smiled back as she attempted to get them out of the way. "They look nice like that," Zuko said as he gently pulled her hands away from them. She couldn't help but to smile, she was on Zuko's ship actually talking with Zuko _and_ she was Fire Nation, how could this day get any better?

"Zuko!? Have you seen the fine cutlery?" Iroh called as he walked onto the bow.

"We were, uuuh, polishing it." Zuko responded.

"Good for you." Iroh said. "We could use the help." Alura looked at Zuko and shook her head in disbelief. With a smile Alura grabbed a fork and started rubbing it with a rag. She smiled at Iroh who saw her hair and said. "You look like you could be Zuko's sister."

"Uuuuh, thank you?" Alura half stated half asked. Her gold eyes looked back to Zuko again once Iroh left with the forks, and asked, "That was compliment, wasn't it?" in response Zuko just shrugged. He was like that, sometimes he acted like he had the answers to everything (which was annoying), and the rest of the time he acted like he didn't have a clue about anything (which was even more annoying). But Zuko was Zuko, and Zuko was as Zuko did…and Zuko, as Alura had learned in the past three hours, did annoying quite a lot. But Zuko also, as she had learned the night before, did kind and considerate occasionally too.

"I don't think he meant to insult you." Zuko stated suddenly. "But it was a strange compliment…I guess it could have been worse though…he could have said that you look like Azula."

"Didn't he though?" Alura responded.

That night Zuko and Alura hid while the crew had 'music night', though if you were to ask Alura and Zuko they would tell you it sounded more like 'impersonate a sick cow-monkey night'. "When does the agony cease!" Alura exploded, nearly Fire Bending the map on the wall into obliteration.

"Calm down Ali." Zuko stated. "It's just my uncle and the crew pretending they have talent."

"Yeah, well someone had better tell them not to quit their day jobs." Alura replied. "And by someone I mean you…hey it stopped!"

"That's odd." Zuko stated as his uncle opened the door. "For the last time I will not play the stupid sungi horn!"

"We have company."

"Admiral Zhao," Zuko stated coldly. For a Fire Bender Zuko could be a cold person.

"So this is the great Admiral Zhao I've heard so much about." Alura said in a tone that matched her name. "to be truthful, Zuko, I'm a little disappointed, I thought the great Admiral Zhao would be, oh, I don't know…great." She looked at Zuko and saw his jaw was unhinged at the disrespecting and authorative tone Alura had taken. It may not have shown, but Alura was a little shocked herself. Her tone was icy and unreadable, her eyes, unblinking, were showing no emotion, and her jaw was set firm; no one in the room dared to contradict her or even to talk. She now had control of this situation, and she might be able to change things. "I'm sorry you must have _something_ important to say if you came all this way…"

"As a matter of fact…" Zhao started in an aggravated tone. He went on to explain that he was taking Zuko's crew. And that he couldn't risk Zuko getting in his way at the North Pole.

"That is such a typical Zhao maneuver." Zuko said the next morning. "Ali, what happened to you last night?" He looked at her and waited for an answer. "You scared me... and I think Admiral Zhao was scared too."

"Remember how I told you that your life was my favorite work of fiction back home?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

"Well, Admiral Zhao was going to try and make you admit that you can use duel swords."

"So?"

"So he knows you're the Blue Spirit, dunder-head!"

"I know." Zuko responded. There was a sudden bang of a door being opened and Alura and Zuko went to investigate. Alura looked out a window in the center of the ship.

"Uh, dunder-head, does that scaly looking bird look familiar?" Alura asked. Zuko came over to see what she was talking about. Then, BANG! There was a huge explosion.

Alura opened her eyes underwater; Zuko was sinking in the wreckage of his ship. Alura grabbed his hand and began to swim to the surface. "You're welcome, dunder-head, you're welcome."

"Thanks, Ali, I didn't know you cared that much." Zuko said wiping his long, thin strand of hair out of his eyes.

"Yeah, well, I do, and don't forget it." She said shaking the water out of her hair. They were tired, wet hungry, and needed a change of clothes, Zuko was scraped to no end, and Alura had a spiral shaped burn on her arm. Other than that they were fine. While Ali was shaking her hair the comb Zuko had made went flying into the dirt.

"You dropped this," Zuko stated as he reached out and picked it up.

"Thank you." Alura replied as she placed it back into her saturated braids. Zuko looked at Alura and couldn't help but to laugh. She looked odd with her hair wet, she wasn't the cool, up tempo girl he'd met two days before she was wet, burnt, battered, and bruised. She was still up tempo, just thrashed to no end. As the two teens sat laughing Alura caught sight of something. "Zuko, your uncle, he's seen what happened…he probably thinks…." She didn't want to say it, since she had felt the same way when she had seen him starting to drowned.

"Oh, Ali," Zuko said.

"What?" Alura asked concerned by Zuko's tone.

"We have to stow away on Zhao's ship,"

"What!" Alura said angry this time.

"It's the only way we can get to the North Pole now."

"Yeah, that may be. But how are we going to get back?!"

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it." Zuko stated. That was the Zuko that Alura had watched on TV, the leap then look back on his plan and be distracted just long enough for someone to sneak up and attack him Zuko that was obsessed with hunting the Avatar, and sadly the Zuko she had wish to meet all her life. That was when she realized that his mind was somewhere else, off in a place where pain was an unknown feeling, and, sadly, a place he would never get to be. She looked into his golden eyes, and touched his arm bringing him back to his senses. "Let's go disappoint the world." He said. She sighed, knowing all too well he meant letting his uncle know they had survived the explosion.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three; Destiny Bound and Bound to Destiny

Ali looked at Zuko as they got ready to dive into a whole carved into the ice. This was not the swim to the North Pole she quite had planned. Zuko had his arm around her waist. They had slipped on and off of Zhao's ship unnoticed. But that wouldn't be what would get them back and unfortunately Alura already knew that.

After they had swum for a while Alura pointed to a tunnel that lead upwards, they were slowly running out of air. That tunnel may have been the only way out so Zuko nodded and they swam up only to find that the end was barricaded by ice. Zuko rammed into it three or four times before Ali rolled her eyes, shoved him out of the way, and cracked the ice using fire bending. Then she pulled a fan that appeared to be made of solid gold out of her sleeve, thrust it into the crack, and turned it like a handle until the ice was completely loose. She was then able to simply remove the ice chunk like a hatch door.

After they had surfaced and had caught their breath, Zuko turned and looked at her, "you just love to make me look bad don't you?"

"Uh, yeah, kind of."

"Zuna! Slow down!"

"Hush! Do you want Dad to know we were eavesdropping?!" Asked Princess Zuna.

"No," Princess Aryl responded with a roll of her delicate white-gold eyes. She hated when her sister played that roll, she looked like an older Azula when she did it. Typically Zuna was more like Zuko, or how he had been the last time they had seen him. Of course, they hadn't seen their brother in three years, things can change in three years time, who knew, and maybe they had changed. They didn't feel like they had, but the eavesdropping was new, so no one knew for sure. "I'm hungry." Zuna looked over her shoulder, with a look that said 'do-you-want-me-to-go-Azula-on-you?' the answer, of course, was no. One Azula was enough, Aryl didn't really want, nor need, another one. "Azula's evil."

"No," said Zuna, "we are. We're traitors." A tear slipped down Zuna's left cheek.

"Are you going to tell me why we've been doing what we've been doing?"

"So Zuko doesn't come home." Said Zuna. She started crying harder until her whole body shook. Aryl looked at Zuna and before she even formed the question in the back of her head, Zuna said, "He's not safe here, Aryl, Azula would do anything to be Fire Lordess, and there are only three things that stand in her way, Father, Zuko, and me."

"But she's daddy's little angel."

"Yeah, that's why all she needs is to keep Zuko's honor from being restored, she wouldn't harm me, I'm not who dad would put as his heir, she is, but Zuko has his birth-right to the throne. If we let her think that we're helping her, and then the rest is easy, we get her on the throne, and then we get Zuko back in the Fire Nation with help from the Avatar."

"Then what?" asked Aryl.

"Then we have the Avatar make the throne available for its proper heir." Zuna said shaking out her black curls with a regal air about her. "Now come on, we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow."

"For Zuko's twin you sure are a lot like Azula." Mumbled Aryl as she fallowed her oldest sister down the long hallway. Luckily for her, Zuna hadn't even been paying attention.

He took a deep breath, there was going to be a lot of trouble if things went wrong, and worse, he had about as big of a chance of getting them to go right as he did at getting the blasting jelly to do it with. He got back to the platform.

"Bad news guy's we have to wait for our little project." He said to the group. Then he walked to his bunk.

"Jet? What's wrong now?" asked a voice from behind him.

"There is no way that we are going to invade the village without a distraction, Meller." He responded. "I just don't want you guys to lose faith in me."

"Jet," Smellerbee's scratchy voice said, "you're just a teenager, you're not expected to be perfect, nobody's right all the time." She placed her hand on top of his armored shoulder.

"Yeah, well, it's not as simple as it sounds when you've never been wrong." Jet replied with a bitter note in his voice.

"Maybe you should sleep on things a bit," she told him. "We have a big day ahead of us." She walked out of the room and he lay down, and closed his eyes.

"Jet!"

"Huh?" he asked. Smellerbee was leaning over him with some sort of flask in her hand, when she began to move it towards his lips he pushed it away. "Keep that thing away from me."

"Hush, you know that you need to drink it." She looked at him, "that is, unless you don't want to heal and have me explain that you've been sick to all of the Freedom Fighters." With a reluctant sigh he accepted the flask full of disgusting herbal remedy and grudgingly swallows a mouth full.

"That stuff never gets better." He said handing it back to the small tom-boy.

"At lease you're not coughing it up any more."

"Tell me the truth, I'm not just sick, huh, this has to do with…the fight."

"Yes." She hadn't planned on telling him that, much less him coming to that conclusion on his own. "But you're getting better."

"I'll never fully recover." He said more than asked.

"no." she said. "But no one besides you, Long shot, and myself will ever know about it."

"Unless I get sick again."

"Yes, but that most likely won't happen."

"Since when has my life ever gone with the best-case scenario?"

"This would be a first." She said regretting it instantly.

"Whatever you do, don't cremate me." He said as a sliver of a smile appeared on his sad face.

"Deal." She responded with a fake smile painted on her own.

After that Smeller bee walked from Jet's bunk to Long shots. Long shot looked at her unblinking. "How do _you _think it went?!" he blinked. "I'm sorry; it's just that he figured it out." His lip twitched. "Not that! The other thing!" He blinked again. "I know, I know, but it hurts me to see him in pain." She said finally. He blinked twice and his lip tweaked into a half-smirk. "Oh, don't you dare start in on that! LA-LA-LA….not listening!" she stormed out of the room and he just shrugged innocently.

Katara was off by herself, thinking about the Fire Bender that was fallowing them, what a heartless jerk he was, fallowing them, and trying to capture the world's last hope for peace. Sokka came walking up and tugged her braid in greeting. "Hey sis." He said.

"Hey" she responded.

"Aang's been looking for you."

"So?" she really wanted to be alone, and more accurately, she wanted to think about the fire bender, Prince Zuko. She wanted to know what the deal with his scar was. She wanted to get to know him. He actually looked like he might have half a human-being inside of him, instead of just the beast that Sokka claimed him to be.

"Oh, and Princess Yue is with him." At this her blue eyes got wide, no madder how much she would have preferred to think about Zuko she didn't want Aang alone with Yue. She stood up and rushed past her brother.

"It's about time you got here," Aang stated, "We're going to the spirit oasis."

"Cool." Said Katara, "what for."

"To help Aang get into the spirit world." Said Yue. Katara nodded, 'I wonder if Zuko likes swimming. I wish he wouldn't chase us…oh who am I kidding, he's so cute I don't even care.' Then she began to hum, she looked at Aang and began to sing _"I look in your eyes, and I feel your pain._

_I look out the window, and wonder…_

_Do you know my name?_

_Do you feel the same?_

_If I saw you, would you admit that you know me? _

_If I needed you to, would you run here to hold me?" _she saw Aang's eyes light up, and she knew that he had gotten the wrong impression.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four; the Water Bender and the Winners' Circle

Avatar was completely oblivious when they ambushed, and the water tribe girl almost looked disappointed when Zuko and Alura just left her behind. "Shouldn't we take the girl too?" Ali asked.

"No, we need to travel light, one dead weight is enough." Zuko replied. And Ali watched as the water-tribe girl's heart was broken by her Secret Dream.

"Whatever you say, Zuko." Ali responded as she helped Zuko bind the Avatar in front of Katara.

"You need me." Katara stated daringly.

"Really, how is that?"

"I'm the only one who can get you out of here both alive, and unnoticed."

"You want to _help_ us?" Zuko asked.

"Yes." Katara said. "All I want is to help you."

"First, how do we get out of here?" Asked Ali.

"I'll be right back." She said, and she was, on the back of the sky bison. "Next stop, your choice."

"Fire nation capitol." Zuko and Ali said together, looks like water-benders were on the winning side too. (Bet you didn't see that coming.)

They were along ways away when Aang woke up. "What happened?"

"Your little water-bender friend joined the Winners, Avatar, that's 'what happened'." Said Zuko, bluntly. "Oh, and don't try to escape, you'll fall to your death, and my father wants you alive." At the front of Appa's saddle was Prince Zuko; at the back were Katara and some fire nation girl talking about how excited they were about going to the Capitol. '_Why, Katara?' _Aang thought sadly,_ 'why don't you love me? Why are you on _their_ side? What about all of those things you said about your mother…About the fire nation? '_


End file.
